


dawn's first light

by Caisar



Series: Bad Things Happen Bingo [3]
Category: Deus Ex (Video Games)
Genre: Bad Things Happen Bingo, Gen, Not Black Light Compliant, Pre-Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, Presumed Dead
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-16
Updated: 2020-02-16
Packaged: 2021-02-27 19:54:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22611367
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Caisar/pseuds/Caisar
Summary: Adam survives Panchaea. Not everyone knows that.He flinches, his eyes widening—finallystarting to get the picture. “You’re not implying—”“No, Adam, I’mtellingyou that Pritchard is going after TF29,” she says bluntly, honestly, the way she should have from the beginning. The way she should have been with Pritchard when she got that call from Alaska. “I don’t know how close he is, or what he already knows; but we both know he’s going to find out more than he’s looking for. He’s going to find outeverything—and when he does? It won’t be pretty.”
Relationships: Adam Jensen & Faridah Malik, Adam Jensen/Francis Pritchard
Series: Bad Things Happen Bingo [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1626937
Comments: 5
Kudos: 23
Collections: Bad Things Happen Bingo





	dawn's first light

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Yobotica](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yobotica/gifts).



> Title from: _Icarus_ by CHRISTON. You see what I did there.
> 
> Disclaimer: jensard is mostly implied but also fairly central to the story, hence the tag. This fic contains no on-screen jensard.

It’s not the best bar she could sneak her way into, but her glass is more booze than ice, the music doesn’t make her ears bleed and people don’t stare at Augs too hard—three things she couldn’t say for anywhere else she’s been to in Prague.

Not that she’s been doing a lot of bar-hopping. Her time in Sarif Industries—and isn’t that a name she wasn’t dying to think of tonight—has done a good job of training a regular sleep cycle out of her; but the streets of Prague at night are nothing short of a horror movie. She’s only out here tonight because the thoughts inside her head were worse.

At least Sarif hadn’t minded the fuel she wasted on the nights she needed an escape.

That was a different time, though. A different life.

She was a different person, too.

Maybe.

She shakes her head, stabbing her short straw at the melting ice at the bottom. Getting maudlin on herself—always a good sign to call it a night. Except that she doesn’t want to. Calling it a night means walking back to her hotel room, alone; it means checkpoints and barricades and power-drunk police officers getting in her face about half a dozen different documents that she needed to get forged to “prove” her improved synapses don’t make her a criminal.

She signals the bartender for _ještě jedno_ , who gives her a careful look-over but takes the glass anyway, leaving her with the coaster. It’s an ugly brown that blends with the counter, worn and peeling at the edges, the bar’s name written across it. The internet says it means _brave_.

A sign, if she’s willing to take it that way.

Holding up the coaster between two fingers, she snaps a quick picture and types: _Drinking alone. Join me._

* * *

Two drinks in, Adam is more relaxed than she ever remembers seeing him: shields off, sleeves pushed up, his new too-expensive trench coat piled up on the stool next to him that no one dared take. He’s been _talking_ , even—about everything and nothing; she’s lost the thread somewhere between an asshole colleague and the coffee machine at work.

Work that he’s been _very_ careful to talk around. A couple drinks every few months doesn’t make them the best of friends; but they should’ve been above half-truths by now, considering. Guess not.

Around them, the track finally dies down, something faster and even more intelligible replacing it. He taps along to the starting beats—almost an exact match—before folding his forearms on the counter, leaning forward. “You never told me what brought you to my city.”

His city that won’t ever accept him as its own. “Life,” she says simply, shrugging a shoulder. “Work. Money. Take your pick.”

He gives her a dry look. “I’ll take the truth, thanks.”

It wasn’t a lie, exactly; she _is_ here on business. A scheduling conflict left her on paid leave; but two more days and she’ll be back on a chopper to Detroit.

The choice of Prague for a layover wasn’t random, though.

She pokes at the lime slice on the edge of her glass until it sinks into the liquid and rises again. “It’s Pritchard.”

His eyes cut at her. Without the shields, he looks naked, in a way—all his feelings written across his face for everyone to see. Longing and regret and fear she can spot before he reaches for his drink, swirling the last of it around and tipping it down in one smooth motion.

An odd guilt curls in the pit of her stomach, like she just took a good look at his bedroom.

His expression schooled back into the usual wall, “Is he here?” he asks, glancing at the mostly empty bar behind them as if Pritchard could jump out of some corner any moment.

She shakes her head. “Still in Detroit. I told him I was going to visit an old friend.” Which she is. What Pritchard doesn’t know won’t hurt him.

If she repeats it enough, she just might start believing it.

The lines of his shoulders relax minutely, just visible enough without his usual layers. “Good. Let’s keep it that way.”

If only.

She runs a hand through her hair—too long by her standards; she should get it taken care of once she’s back home—and leans closer. He’s already grimacing. “Adam—”

“Please don’t.”

“—he deserves to know, too,” she pushes on. Not an argument she expects to win, not after all the times they’ve treaded over it; but she couldn’t live with herself if she didn’t at least try. “You weren’t there, you didn’t see him. After Panchaea—”

“We all lost something after Panchaea,” he bites out. “Things we can’t get back. It's time to move on.”

 _To move on._ “Like you did with TF29?”

He stills—surprisingly noticeable. “You’re not supposed to know about that,” he says carefully, his gaze sharpening.

Her sensors remain passive. No CASIE, no trespassing.

“I’m not supposed to know a lot of things,” she pipes up, flashing him her best fake grin even as frustration starts to thicken in her chest, spreading into her lungs. “You didn’t mind it when it helped you, Spy Boy.”

“It’s not the same thing,” he snaps—she’ll eat her headset if this is not a man trying to convince himself first. “You don’t have Sarif to buy your way out of trouble anymore. If the Interpol catches you—either of you—flying over too close—”

She can’t help a bitter laugh. “See the problem now?”

He flinches, his eyes widening— _finally_ starting to get the picture. “You’re not implying—”

“No, Adam, I’m _telling you_ that Pritchard is going after TF29,” she says bluntly, honestly, the way she should have from the beginning. The way she should have been with Pritchard when she got that call from Alaska. “I don’t know how close he is, or what he already knows; but we both know he’s going to find out more than he’s looking for. He’s going to find out _everything_ —and when he does? It won’t be pretty.”

“You’ve got to stop him.”

 _As if_. “You think I didn’t try?” she asks—lowers her voice at the bartender’s side glance, the casually cautious way he’s holding himself now. Aug-friendly or not, the last thing they need is more attention. “You know how he gets when he’s on a trail; I would have more luck talking to a rock. He doesn’t sleep, he doesn’t eat—I’ve been mixing vitamins in his caffeine pills and he hasn’t even noticed.” She meets his gaze, shaking her head. “If anyone can stop him, it’s not me.”

A new shadow settles onto his features as he contemplates his empty glass—flags down the bartender. Bad idea, if you ask her. He doesn’t.

Even as impulse demands so, she doesn’t press for answers, allowing him the space to think it over. If she’s being honest with herself—something she hadn’t been often enough, she’s finding—she hadn’t expected to hear more than hard dismissal; it’s already _something_ that he is giving it thought.

Whether that’s a good thing, they’re going to find out soon enough.

When the bartender shows up with Adam’s new drink, she pushes away her mostly-full glass for him to take. The walk is looming large even without the risk of tripping over her own feet.

Rubbing at his forehead, “I can’t come back, Malik,” Adam sighs at last. Another glance down and he’s pulling at his sleeves like they’ve personally offended him, dragging them as far down as they go. “It’s too dangerous. They’ve barely stopped doing background checks on people I brush past on the way to the store; I can’t risk getting him in the Interpol’s radar.”

“ _Pritchard_ is about to get himself in their radar,” she points out, frustration starting to get the better of her. Adam is a smart man; how can be so willfully blind? “And if he gets caught…”

And if he gets caught, Adam will be the one coming to his rescue.

Is that it? Does he plan to play the white knight when the time comes and hope Pritchard will be too grateful to get angry?

No, it doesn’t make sense. Adam can be reckless; but not where Pritchard is concerned. The time it took the two to get anywhere is proof enough.

What is this _really_ about?

“You didn’t jump from Alaska into the waiting arms of the Interpol, Adam,” she says—softly as she can while still hearing herself over the music. Closer to _noise_ now, long as the night wore on. Hard pill to swallow, but she might be getting old for the scene. “You had both the time and the means to reach out to him. Why didn’t you?”

The corners of his lips twitch; the only sign that he’s heard her. He’s quietly frowning down into his thus-untouched drink like it’s both the source and solution to all his problems. Which would explain things.

She didn’t come all the way here to talk at another rock, though. “Adam—”

“He won’t believe me,” he mutters, effortlessly audible. She suppresses a wince at the flatness of his tone—the surety of it. “You know that. He’ll call me counterfeit, a liar—hell, an _experiment_.”

That’s… probably not wrong, is the worst part. Francis Pritchard is many things and cruel _is_ one of them, especially when he feels justified in it. He doesn’t even need to believe any of it to spit his venom on Adam’s face.

“I believed you,” she reminds him. She had no reason to, aside from desperately wanting it to be true; but that didn’t stop her from risking her job to change her route. Would’ve done it again in a heartbeat. “I can vouch for you.”

His lips twitch again, this time to curl up in a wry half-smile. “Then he would call you a fool and a traitor.”

She doesn’t say _don’t care_ —she’s not the lying type and he would see right through it anyway. “Worth it.”

He raises his eyes to her, slowly, with a new emotion shimmering in them. Gratefulness doesn’t fit that face any better than regret.

Maybe she’s doing something right for once after all. Maybe it all won’t end in disaster.

**Author's Note:**

> Written for:  
> \- The lovely [Yobotica](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yobotica), who picked the prompt, _"I can't come back."_ (14) from the [Fictober 2019](https://fictober-event.tumblr.com/post/187637998976/fictober-2019) list. Fictober, February; same difference.  
> \- Bad Things Happen Bingo, for the prompt: missing & presumed dead. (3/25 filled; find the full list [here](https://desynchimminent.tumblr.com/post/181821535129/received-my-card-for-bad-things-happen-bingo-full).) I seem to approach all the prompts at an angle.


End file.
